


make me the shape of everything you need

by orphan_account



Category: Catfish: The TV Show
Genre: M/M, i am so very sorry for this, i sincerely have only apologies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-04
Updated: 2014-06-04
Packaged: 2018-02-03 08:41:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1738301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>they arrive at the hotel in uneasy silence. lobby, elevator, key card, double bed. it’s such a simple routine, clean and repeatable.</i>
  <br/></p>
<p>s2e11 fallout.</p>
            </blockquote>





	make me the shape of everything you need

**Author's Note:**

> this is the result of too much catfish and not enough queer tv presenters.
> 
> i do not know about wives or girlfriends, nor do i care.

after they've dropped aaliyah back at home, her steely expression falling the moment the cameras finish rolling, max drives back to their hotel in silence. he can tell nev is still fuming, jaw set tight as he stares at the road straight ahead, unblinking, unmoving, but his own hands are shaking against the steering wheel and he just wants this all to stop. he wants to swerve to the left and keep driving until they’re far away from this town that’s cloying in the back of his throat. he wants to curl up in a ball and cry the tears of the used and rejected. he wants out.  


his jumper is still wet with aaliyah’s tears and that just twists the knots in his stomach a little tighter. he wishes he knew how to be angry like nev, how to curl his hands into fists and punch himself back together, but he can’t choke up enough venom. every time he tries, he can only see alicia’s face, not bitter and vindictive, but scared and trapped. both the deer in the headlights and the oncoming bus itself. it was a look he recognised all too well, and he had wanted to reach out and comfort her but he couldn’t. not with aaliyah sobbing into his chest and the camera crew taking it all in like the freak-show reality tv they were never meant to be.  


max knows twisted people. they’ve had enough of them on the show, callous and cruel and never thinking of the consequences. alicia’s laugh was too harsh to be truly bitter, and at times she had sounded as though she was sobbing. he wonders what she would have said without the cameras. if she would still have turned away, or if her icy heart would have melted or shattered. if she would have told aaliyah she loved her.  


he doesn’t like to make assumptions – television has given him a fear of being proved wrong – but something about alicia makes him want to take every closeted kid out of hiding if only to allow them to see the sunlight. then he smiles bitterly to himself, remembering his own ambiguity. what right does he have to preach openness in a market that shuts him in tight?  


they arrive at the hotel in uneasy silence. lobby, elevator, key card, double bed. it’s such a simple routine, clean and repeatable. oftentimes it can even be fun – nev making him tea from the breakfast bar, stealing the complimentary soaps, ordering room service while they marathon his favourite movies. now the quiet is deafening, the sheets on the bed stained orange by the sunset. max lays there, still, waiting, watching as nev turns the tv on, then off, paces the room with a face like lightning.  


“sit down,” says max eventually, when he grows dizzy from the back and forth (the room is too small: one bed, two sidetables.) nev turns to him, angry and incredulous, and he looks ready to shout or cry or throw the remote at him. then max watches the emotion drain from his face, leaving a too-tall man in a too-small room and two metres of air between them. his shoulders drop and he looks suddenly older, and yet somehow 21 all over again.  


“sit down,” max repeats, and nev does, perching on the end of the bed. his arm reaches out absentmindedly to rest on max’s leg. max doesn’t move.  


“i’m mad about alicia,” says nev, still staring at the wall. silence continues; the bedside clocks are both digital. max notices one reads 20:42, the other 20:43.  


“i know,” he says softly, recognising the need to be gentle. “you have every right to be.”  


nev sighs at that, then flops onto his back, head coming to rest on the pillow beside max as he finally turns to face him. his eyes aren’t shiny as max expected them to be, but the flint in them has softened. max has never known nev to be anything other than certain, but right now he looks lost. melting. drowning. grasping for a lifebelt.  


“i just want to do them right, y’know?” his voice is too low to be a question, too pondering for a whisper. “all of them. this wasn’t... i never wanted to hurt anyone. i just wanted to help.”  


he shifts, ever so slightly, onto his side, and there it is, the cue to reach out an arm and drag him closer to shore. it’s not a cry for help, nor an admittance of defeat. if anything, max would call it resignation. as it is, he holds nev closer to him, fingers tangling in his shirt as his cheek warms and cools with nev’s breath. he notices a grey hair sticking up from the crown of nev’s head. evidence of a frantic life or pure genetics? he pushes the thought away.  


“you _do_ help,” he tells nev, wanting – needing him to believe it. “they hurt themselves, you know that. it’s not your fault. they come to you, after all.”  
nev looks up into his eyes, almost searching but not quite. “is it enough though?” he asks, far far too quiet. max reaches up a hand to cradle nev’s head, pressing their foreheads together just enough for the skin to tack together with sweat.  


“ _of course it is_ ,” he says forcefully, then closes his eyes, breathes out slowly. “of course you are,” he says, eyes still shut.  


when nev reaches out to slide their fingers together, max just breathes slowly for a moment before he lets himself return to the room, the light fading rapidly outside the still-open window. nev smiles at him, still uncertain, guarded, a trace of venom left on his lips, and max gently tugs him closer. they lay there together, hearts beating an uneasy symphony as they let the day dissipate through the hotel room. max thinks of their flight to vegas next week, and the 37 unopened emails on nev’s laptop. he remembers the couple in the lobby this morning, how he’d stared enviously at the husband’s hand atop the baby bump and felt a pang for a life of minor miracles.  


“one more season,” max mutters, once they’re a web of limbs curled up on the mattress. he feels eyelashes flutter against his cheek, and opens his own eyes to see nev staring at him pleadingly.  


“two more,” he says, voice plaintive, and max almost wants to laugh at this glorious contradiction he gets to call him own. nev looks as though he might start pouting at any moment, though, so max just kisses him on the forehead with a small smile.  


“two more,” he concedes, “then we’ll quit. we’ll get an apartment with the show money, and i can make films and you can teach, yeah?” nev’s nod is practically imperceptible, but he’s smiling properly now and max knows to continue. “and we’ll get a dog, called katie.” nev frowns. “fine, called kayla. and she’ll be a total menace but we’ll love her to death. and we’ll live happily ever after, okay?”  


max’s voice drops low as he squeezes nev’s hand gently where it’s resting above the shirt stretched across his heart. “we won’t forget anyone, nev, i promise. and i’m pretty sure they won’t forget us either. we did good. we’re doing good.”  


nev’s breath is coming slow and even, and max isn’t sure if he’s asleep or daydreaming but he stays still anyway, watching the line of nev’s body against the darkening sheets as the radio display switches to 21:08. he thinks about aaliyah, alone and heartbroken in a home that isn’t her own. he thinks of alicia, trying so hard to be twisted when her shell appears so close to shattering. he thinks about shells and walls and barriers, then abandons it all and thinks about nev. about his flaws. about the cracks in his armour. about how much max just wants him to be happy.  


tomorrow they will meet with alicia again. next week there will be another episode to film, another mystery to unravel. tonight, in a dead-end town on a hotel bedspread, two men fall asleep inventing their own reality.


End file.
